The H20 Esports Campus Amsterdam has had an esports area since the beginning of December: the Red Bull Esports Area. The huge unit took almost two weeks to build and houses ten high-end gaming setups.

Shortly after the opening, the first Red Bull event took place in the Red Bull Esports Area, called Red Bull Flick. The very first 2v2 Counter-Strike: Global Offensive tournament in the Netherlands. It was won by Dion "Fashr" Derksen and Thijs "Rilax" Izaks of DTC The Hague.

Watch the construction of the Red Bull furniture and some short clips from the Red Bull Flick event below.

This article was published in the Noord-Hollands Dagblad as a result of the unique idea to make a tour of the school, as this is physically not possible due to the lockdown. This project was an assignment of secondary school De Triade from Edam for H20 Esports Campus. One of the best builders of the online video game Minecraft, Thomas Bosch, recreated the school for virtual tours. Thomas works for H20 Esports Campus as Minecraft coach. Casper Klinkhamer, also working at H20, then made the video in which viewers are taken inside the school.

Thomas Bosch

In Minecraft, Thomas Bosch is the chief architect of Greenfields, the largest world in this computer game, and he comes from Volendam. He can now put a Minecraft version of SG De Triade on his list. "Everyone understands that because of all the corona measures we cannot organise our education in the way we are used to. But we would still like the pupils of the eighth grade to get to know our building. So I had the idea of doing that virtually; via H20, we came into contact with Bosch," says Van Schendel. Bosch has previously built the H20 Esports Campus in Purmerend in Minecraft.

The open days of SG De Triade were planned on 21 January and 5 February 2021. The programme for these will be adjusted due to the coronation measures. Pupils of group eight can come and get acquainted with the school, for parents a digital alternative will be organised. The preparations are in full swing.

H20 Esports Campus

On the website of SG de Triade, eighth-graders can take a tour of the school building during the open days. The viewer is accompanied by Casper Klinkhamer, who leads visitors through the virtual classrooms. In cooperation with H2O Esports Campus in Purmerend, the entire school building has been reconstructed on its own server and will be used for special workshops.

In it, pupils from De Triade and guest pupils from primary schools learn how to build, stream and work in this game. Jeanine van Schendel: "At a school that teaches technical education, our pupils learn how to build anything. But that's not just with a hammer, a trowel and some bricks. There is also a lot to develop in the digital world. Think about building websites, computers, apps or a school building in Minecraft."

H20 Esports Campus has developed a number of Minecraft training and courses which can be found here.

Minecraft is a game that is very popular among children and young people, everything consists of blocks. With those blocks you can build houses, castles, roller coasters or boats. A video showing how the Minecraft version of De Triade looks like is already on their website

Europe's largest esports campus H20 from Purmerend challenges pupils and students during the lockdown to participate in an online challenge to recreate the facades of Dutch hospitals in Minecraft. The aim of the action is to let young people end this year with a positive activity and at the same time support charities and care workers of the hospitals. 50% of the proceeds will go to charities and 50% to the care workers in the hospitals that will be reconstructed. Before the new year begins, the facades of all hospitals in the Netherlands must be recreated in Minecraft on an actual scale. Between Wednesday 23 and Thursday 31 December, an army of young volunteers (children, pupils, students, etc.) will take on this challenge.

Press conference

We would like to invite you to follow the presentation of this challenge via a live link at the now familiar "corona moment" on Tuesday evening (22 December) at 7 pm. For questions and registration please send a message to pers@h20.gg. If you would like an interview with one of the founders of this challenge, you can also request this via this e-mail address. More information about the challenge can be found at www.minecrafthospitalheroes.com.

Minecraft hospital heroes

The campaign, appropriately named Minecraft Hospital Heroes, came about after the H20 Esports Campus had to close its doors for the third time this year last week.

Campus Founder Dirk Tuip: "Like many entrepreneurs, we were surprised and disappointed by the new lockdown last week. Hundreds of children were going to enjoy activities with us during the Christmas holidays on the cutting edge of healthy gaming, hybrid (e)sports and creative tech. That would have been a nice ending to a crazy year." 

Tuip continued: "Now that these activities cannot continue, we desperately wanted to do something for the children sitting at home and at the same time do something against the negative, powerless and sometimes desperate feeling that Corona causes."

With the addition of the sponsorship action, a number of charities can now be supported. Potential sponsors can more or less adopt the online hospitals. Each hospital that receives enough sponsorship will be reconstructed during the challenge." More information can be found at www.minecrafthospitalheroes.com. 

Watching via live stream

H20 Co-Founder Matthijs Vink explains: "By rebuilding the hospitals, we can offer students a unique and educational challenge so that after the Christmas holidays they can say that they have built a real hospital on scale together with others and show their parents how gaming can contribute to skills such as creativity, cooperation and communication and of course tech. With this action, we also want to thank all the care workers of the various hospitals for their efforts during the Corona crisis. Those who do not participate in the construction can watch the construction via a live stream on www.minecrafthospitalheroes.com. "We hope that many people will see the action. The year 2020 will never be forgotten by so many people, especially because of Corona and the impact on the direct and indirect victims."

One of the best Minecraft builders in the world

The building project is led by 17-year-old Thomas Bosch. He was the architect of Greenfield, one of the largest cities ever built in Minecraft. Thomas built the city together with dozens of regular builders and hundreds of volunteers. The whole project took almost 10 years and thousands of man hours. During this challenge, Thomas is leading the Minecraft Hospital Heroes construction team via Discord, an online platform for gaming, chatting and talking.

Proceeds to charities and hospitals 

Half of the proceeds will go to the staff associations of the hospitals built. The other half of the proceeds will go to a number of charities that help to get children who have been badly affected by Corona moving. These include Stichting Het Vergeten Kind, the Cruyff Foundation, and Kanjer Wens Nederland, which help grant the wishes of children with a serious illness or chronic condition. In total, the challenge supports 6 charities. More information is available at www.minecrafthospitalheroes.com.

Call for Minecraft builders: help out and build your local hospital

H20 is also still looking for experienced Minecraft builders, to help build Minecraft Hospital Heroes, the challenge of 2020! They can sign up via www.minecrafthospitalheroes.com. It is estimated that dozens of volunteers are needed. We want to link the builders as much as possible to hospitals in their own region or city.

During the Christmas holidays, handball fans can visit the H20 Esports Campus Netherlands for, among other things, the ehandball camps. The combination of sports, virtual reality and gaming is a spearhead of the campus. Various well-known people from the handball world, such as Jordy Baijens, former handball international Silvia Hofman and Aalsmeer player Destin van Dijk, are actively working on the ehandball programme at the campus. As a partner, HV KRAS/Volendam is closely involved in the initiative.

At H20, the aim is to put hybrid sport, a combination of traditional sport and sport through gaming, on the map. Matthijs Vink, former handball international and co-founder of H20: "Due to all kinds of technological developments, you also see different needs among the new generation of children. They are used to elements that are normal in the gaming world. And they also need more speed, freedom and dynamism. We combine these elements so that children still get moving, but in new ways.

We hope to further develop ehandball into a training skill in itself. There are many possibilities with new techniques and we want to develop them here at the Campus. I think that innovation will also give the pleasure of playing an extra boost. And in the end, that's what it's all about: doing what gives you pleasure!

Handball camp, Handball Experience Tour and team outings

There are 3 activities that can be booked directly during the Christmas holidays: a Handball Experience Tour for families, a unique Ehandball Team Outing and an Ehandball Camp where children up to 16 years old are entertained with all kinds of handball activities all day long. One of the activities is a cross between gaming and physical handball, by using the Esports Wall on Campus. This is a virtual game on the wall where visitors can train handball techniques. Furthermore it is possible to play handball in Virtual Reality and there are 'Smart' handballs that can tell a player all about his or her skills. And, of course, Handball 21 on PlayStation 4 will also be on the programme. Please visit www.h20.gg/ehandball for more information.

Matthijs Vink sees a rich future for developing ehandball. "We believe that the innovation and development of sport towards Hybrid sports should be driven by (ex) professionals and young tech talent. Jordy, Silvia and Destin, but also Dirk and I fit into this perfectly and will develop the Hybrid sports with the tech talents of H20, starting with handball and basketball and football will follow soon after."

Starting this weekend, kids from the municipality of Edam/Volendam can sign up to play games, sport and learn new skills at the largest esports centre in Europe in Purmerend: H20 Esports Campus. Every Friday and Saturday the H20 esports bus will pick up kids from Edam and Volendam and bring them home again. This is made possible by the Municipality of Edam-Volendam through the LEF programme. There are two pick-up points: Volendam's swimming pool, the Waterdam, and Edam's bus station.

The esports bus is currently being printed and will make its first ride on Friday at 6am. Initially, the focus will be on young people between the ages of 14 and 17. This will be extended later on. Of course, strict attention will be paid to the corona measures on the bus, the driver will wear a mouth mask and we expect the passengers to wear these as well.

Times and exact boarding points can be found at www.h20.gg/fun. Signing up in advance is a requirement. Apart from the bus, children are always welcome to come to H20 Esports in Purmerend. The centre is open from Wednesday to Friday from 16:00 to 22:00 and on Saturday and Sunday from 12:00 to 22:00.

The municipality of Edam-Volendam has entered into a partnership with the H20 Esports Campus in Purmerend. Young people can take a game bus to the campus every weekend to take part in the Weekend Fun Nights, which is part of the municipality's LEF programme.

The LEF programme aims to reduce substance use in the municipality among young people up to 18 years of age. According to the municipality, gaming and esports activities are very well suited to the 14-18 year-old target group, which is the core target group of LEF. Initially, the city will give five hundred young people a try-out ticket that will give them the opportunity to play for three hours in the Omen Gaming Club in the Rabo Esports Stadium. On Fridays and Saturdays, a gaming bus will drive back and forth from the city to the campus several times a day.

Perfect partner

The spokesperson for the municipality of Edam-Volendam sees H20 as the perfect partner. "LEF seeks to collaborate with many initiatives in the municipality. Everything is aimed at offering our young people up to the age of 18 an alternative to parties at home and the use of alcohol and drugs on Friday and Saturday evenings. H20 is such an alternative and a great initiative. It really has everything! That is why we are very happy to work together and even arrange a shuttle bus to give children from the community the chance to get to know everything that is possible here. Soon the 'bus stops' will be announced where you can get on. This is paradise on earth for many young people up to the age of 18!

For the whole family

For families with children aged 11 to 15, there is also the Esports Experience Tour. The tour aims to create more understanding among parents for their gaming children. The tour also gives children perspective on their future and the role of gaming and tech in it.

Two joint events have also been planned on the Rabo Esports Stadium mainstage, where young people from the municipality of Edam-Volendam can enjoy the coolest games played by examples from the gaming, esports and sports world.

The game bus is made possible by LEF, Rabobank, De Warmtesteen Edelstenen, Airco en Elektra, Hein Koning, Provide, Be-Active, among others.

Tomorrow the doors of the H20 Esports Campus and Rabo Esports Stadium will officially open. With this, game lovers can meet each other in the largest and only permanent esports stadium of the Netherlands. Anneke van Zanen, chairman of NOC*NSF, together with author and former esports player Koen Schobbers, will officially open the stadium. As icing on the cake, Prince Constantijn of Orange will make his appearance in an online broadcast from the Inside Esports Studio.

Event in corona times

Despite the Corona conditions, a striking and unique opening programme was creatively put together, with an online and offline event. Organising an event during the current global pandemic requires creative thinking, as experienced by General Manager at H20 Sjaak Kuil. "With a maximum of 30 participants in a room, it was quite a puzzle how to organise the opening. We divided the day up into time slots and each time slot has 30 visitors. They will be treated to an attractive programme on our main stage in the Rabo Esports Stadium."

Laying the foundation stone in Minecraft

In each time slot we have planned a special highlight. For example, the entire H20 building, covering 10,000 m2, has been reconstructed in Minecraft. The last bricks are symbolically laid by the children of the founders of H20. This moment concludes the long preparations for this unique project. Kuil: 'We are extremely proud that we can bring gamers together and help the next generation with their development through gaming, esports and creative tech. The help we get from our main sponsor Rabobank and all our partners has helped us tremendously.

Live Gaming

Apart from the opening ceremony, there will be show matches in the stadium. By, among others, the number two Fornite player in the Netherlands: Milan. And also Dutch champion Zwift (ecycling) Mick Kemper will cycle a live race. Moreover, a Virtual Reality stand is unveiled where visitors of the H20 Esports Campus can play games with VR glasses.

Online broadcast at 20.00

Sjaak Kuil believes that the launch event should take place both physically and digitally. "It is a hybrid event, so various items and highlights will be recorded live. At 20.00 hours there will be an online broadcast on Twitch from the Inside Esports Studio and Prince Constantijn will join us."

The broadcast can be seen at https://www.twitch.tv/H20_esports. From Saturday it can be watched again on the website of H20."